Manufacturing of products includes design not only of a product but also of the manufacturing system itself. Design of the manufacturing system includes design of the infrastructure and element thereof, such as production stations and data repositories. The design should also consider a manufacturing process including a process flow between production stations at a manufacturing plant. In addition, consideration should be given to a configuration of the production station itself, including what functions the station is to perform.
A company may wish to manufacture a product at one or more remote manufacturing plants, for example, at one or more CMs (contract manufacturers). Manufacturing systems and infrastructure for generating, collecting and storing data, for configuring the production stations, and for managing different configurations of the product should ideally be compatible between the company and the CMs.
A company may be an entity for which the products are being manufactured, and it may be the entity that drives demand for products to be manufactured by a CM and that pays the CM for such manufactured products. A company may be the entity owning the product design. Such company may also be the entity for which a particular product is being manufactured under OEM (original equipment manufacturer) branding. A company may perform its own manufacturing, for example, at its own manufacturing plant. In such a case, there is no third party CM, and the company and the CM may essentially be one and the same entity. In other situations, the company and the CM may be different entities but belong to the same parent entity. For example, the company may be a U.S.-based subsidiary and the CM a China-based subsidiary of the same parent entity. In such a situation, whether the company and the CM are treated as two different entities or as a single entity may depend on how demand is driven, payments are made, and confidential and proprietary information is shared between the two subsidiaries. A company and a CM are typically, but not necessarily, separate from suppliers of components and subassemblies to be incorporated into manufactured products and from suppliers of the equipment used in the manufacturing process. This may also apply to customers, i.e., entities purchasing the manufactured product from the company.
In order to manufacture a product, various types of data and software typically needs to be transferred to the manufacturing plant. Such data related to the product itself includes, for example, a BOM (bill of materials) and may further include software in one or more revisions to be installed on the product to be manufactured. Multiple revisions of software may be needed if the product is configurable via software. In addition, data and software may need to be transferred to the manufacturing plant in order to configure the tasks performed on the production station. Such data may include instructions and specifications to be used by an operator of the production station. Instructions may be provided, for example, in the form of a manual for training purposes and thereafter as a reference, as a flow chart, check list or the like to be posted at or near the production station for the operator to refer to during processing at the production station, or the like. Instructions may be transferred in hardcopy format and mailed to the manufacturing plant. Instructions may alternatively be transferred in electronic format (e.g., on a CD-ROM, via email) for installation on the production station to be displayed to the operator during processing, to be printed at the manufacturing plant (e.g., manuals for reference), or a combination thereof. Specifications may include information related to the product to be manufactured, to the operation of the production station, to the configuration of the product and/or the production station, and the like. For example, specifications may include a table, list or other description of what software revision is to be installed depending on the part number, customer, branding, and so forth of the product being manufactured. Specifications may also include a table, list, or other description of what software, instructions, and specifications are to be installed on or otherwise used at the production station depending on the part number, customer, branding, and so forth of the product being manufactured. Specifications, like instructions, may be transferred to the production plant in hardcopy or electronic format. Software is transferred in electronic format. In some instances, new revisions of software for configuration of the production station is provided as part of a visit to the manufacturing plant by an engineer from the company responsible for its installation on such production stations and possibly also for training of die operators during the visit.
As noted, transfer of data and software to the manufacturing plant frequently includes multiple types media (e.g., hardcopy, electronic format). In addition, the transfer may involve different time frames. Data and software provided via email for example, arrives at the manufacturing plant faster than data and software provided via regular mail or withheld until the next visit by an engineer from the company. Although new or updated data and software may have arrived at the manufacturing plant, it may not be put into effect immediately upon receipt, or some production stations or parts of the process flow may be updated at one time and other stations and parts of the process flow at a later time. Such time differences, in arrival of data and software, their being put into effect, or both, may result in production stations in a manufacturing line being differently configured, causing line stops, delays, and the like.
After the product has been manufactured, various types of manufacturing data associated with the product may be needed at the company and thus need to be transferred from the manufacturing plant. Post-production use of manufacturing data may include customer service and repair. Depending on the manner and extent of collection of manufacturing data daring the manufacturing process, some or all such data needed for the post-production use may not be available at all, in various formats such as a combination of paper and electronic format, stored to various locations such as a traveler card, local production stations, and a manufacturing database, and the like. This may cause difficulties and delays in transferring manufacturing data from the manufacturing plant back to the company and may make it difficult to analyze manufacturing data to, for example, measure the effectiveness of the manufacturing process or to improve manufacturing yield.
Some products include technology in particularly skilled areas. Examples of skilled areas of technology include radio frequency and microwave technologies in products such as microwave radios, medical devices such as X-ray, CAT (computed axial tomography) or MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) machines, or fiber optics systems. Such products often include one or more subassemblies capable of configuration. Errors in the manufacture of a product may result, after shipping, in unacceptable performance, liability for failing to conform to regulations or standards, or other anticipated or unanticipated problems. In some skilled areas of technology, such as those involved in medical devices, errors may cause physical harm.
Therefore, there is a need to consider the foregoing in the design of manufacturing systems and methods and the benefit of a system infrastructure capable of being ported to multiple manufacturing plants, including plants lacking personnel with a skill set in a particular technology. One desired aspect of such design might be to substantially increase accessibility of data and software used at various production stages.